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Protests Across America on Saturday for Immigration; George Takei Shares His Experience

Protests Across America on Saturday for Immigration; George Takei Shares His Experience
Karl-Ludwig Poggeman is licensed under CC BY-2.0
Children were taken away from their parents

Gage Skidmore [CC BY-SA 3.0],
from Wikimedia Commons
For George Takei, an American of Japanese descent, Trump's immigration policies brought back memories of the time when Japanese Americans were imprisoned inside barbed wire compounds[/tweetit] simply due to their ethnicity.

The Trump administration has faced, and continues to encounter, a lot of flak for its draconian policies. Crowds railed against the government in almost all population centers, shouting their demand of keeping families together. President Donald J. Trump's immigration policy forcefully separated migrants and their children on the country's border with Mexico.

Protests Across America on Saturday for Immigration; George Takei Shares His Experience[/tweetthis]

Takei himself spent a large part of his childhood inside U.S. internment camps. He did understand exactly how Muslims felt when they heard about the ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold the travel ban imposed by the Trump administration.

In Washington, the capital city of the United States, Lin-Manuel Miranda, the creator of the extremely popular musical Hamilton, dedicated a song to parents who suffered the scene of their children being taken away. He reminded the audience that these caged up children could not sleep with the lullabies sung by their parents. He informed them that he composed the song “Dear Theodosia,” to tell the story of parents trying to make the world a better place for their children. In the musical, it is sung by two of the founding fathers of the U.S., Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton.

Protesters were everywhere, from pro-immigrant cities like Los Angeles and New York to conservative metropolises like Wyoming and Appalachia. They clustered near a McAllen, Texas Border Patrol Station. Protesters thronged a migrant children detention center. They came together near the entrance of Trump's golf resort located at Bedminster in New Jersey, where President Trump was spending his weekend. Maxine Waters, the U.S. Representative, spoke angrily to the president. The Democrat chided him for breaking up families.

The protests had their effect. The president backed away from his contentious family separation policy, but not before government officials separated approximately 2,000 children from their parents. The latter tried to gain entry into the United States without proper documents. They were fleeing economic collapse, persecution or violence in their respective home countries.

Takei remains confident about the United States correcting itself in the future. He reminded his readers that President Ronald Reagan in 1988 apologized officially to Japanese Americans for their unjust internment.

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